


(do you) Love Me Still

by Destina



Category: Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Angst with a Happy Ending, Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Episode Tag, First Kiss, First Time, Friends to Lovers, Happy Ending, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Missing Scene, Ohana, Past Steve McGarrett/Catherine Rollins, Post-Canon, Post-Canon Fix-It, Post-Finale, Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD, Snark, Steve figures stuff out, adult conversations, all Steve's Danny feels, let's be real it's a lot of Steve figuring out stuff to make that ending make sense
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-05-20
Updated: 2020-05-23
Packaged: 2021-03-03 03:01:34
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 20,180
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24277804
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Destina/pseuds/Destina
Summary: In the aftermath of Danny's abduction and near-fatal wounding, Steve leaves the islands in search of peace for himself, and to ensure the safety of the people he loves. With time and rest, and the help of hisohana, he finds his way home again.
Relationships: Steve McGarrett/Danny "Danno" Williams
Comments: 94
Kudos: 367





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> I wrote a fix-it, because I pretty much had to address the missing scenes and that ending to the series finale. Beta by the absolutely amazing topaz (topaz119), who made this story better in every way and went above and beyond by reading the final draft.

They took Daiyu Mei into custody, and once the formalities were over with, Steve immediately returned to the hospital to be at Danny's side. Not to wake him and tell him they got her, or listen to his annoying jokes and attempts to make Steve feel better, but to sit beside him while he slept and watch him breathe. It seemed to be the only way to convince his hindbrain that Danny was actually alive; it had conjured up terrible images of what he'd return to once he wrapped up the case. 

He had no real sense of time passing, beyond the steady hum and beep of the monitors and the parade of nurses on their regular rounds. When Junior came in with coffee for him, he looked up, surprised. "No thanks," he said. 

"I can spell you for a minute if you want to take a break, get something else," Junior said, and Steve frowned and shook his head. 

"No, I'm good." 

"Are you sure, Steve?" Tani, from the doorway; she had a sandwich carton in her hand, probably stale leftovers from the cafeteria. How many hours had they all spent down there over the years, waiting to hear if someone they'd brought in bloody was dead? The thought turned his stomach. 

"I'm sure, thanks." 

"You should-"

"I'm fine," Steve said sharply. "Really, I'm good, and I'd appreciate it if you'd just leave us be." He glanced back at Danny, afraid that he'd raised his voice enough to wake him, but he didn't move. The monitors showed his heart beating on steadily, no change. "Just...go home, get some rest. Please." 

He ignored the obvious way they exchanged glances over his head, because his focus had to be on Danny, on the movement of his chest: in, out. In, out. He heard them saying all the nice platitudes about calling if he needed anything or wanted a shower or whatever. There was a roaring in his ears; he pressed his palms over them, then slid his hands up to the top of his head and rested his forehead against the edge of the mattress. Their footsteps retreated, out of the room, away. 

Once they were gone he sat up, curled his fingers around Danny's wrist, and held on. 

Hours later, once he'd interrogated the nurses and satisfied himself that Danny was stable, he drove home to an empty house. Junior was probably with Tani; that made sense. It had been a bad couple of days. They needed each other. 

He stood in the dark just inside the front door of his father's home, thinking of the first time he'd come back after Dad's murder, and nausea flooded over him, sharp and cold. Eddie barked and whined anxiously at the stranger in his house, this stinking, sweating, hollowed-out version of Steve, who staggered to the back door and out into the yard.

He fell onto his hands and knees in the grass, and vomited until all he could do was retch bile, his body heaving. He was shaking too badly to stand, so he rolled onto his back beside his own mess and stared up at the blackness above him, lit by distant stars and the creeping icy light of the moon. Steve dug the heels of his hands into his closed eyes and let the hitching sobs come, because he had no control over his body any longer. 

When it was all wrung out of him, he was so exhausted he could have slept right there in the cool night air, but his brain was churning, forcing him to relive all that had happened. He kept circling back to the decision he'd made even before Danny was taken, though he hadn't had the chance to tell the team. 

The shadow of death had been hanging over him since he returned to Hawaii -- since he lost his father. In some ways, he'd been slowing down ever since, and in the process, accumulating more and more reasons to hesitate. His team, his ohana, people he loved, that he would die for - almost had, a hundred times. 

The irony of his timing didn't escape him - he had been weighing the decision to leave for weeks, but he hadn't managed to go in time to prevent Danny's kidnapping, or any of the aftermath. He was waylaid by doubt, second-guessing every critical decision, which had never happened to him before. He was floored by it, by the way a long run couldn't banish it, or a long swim in the ocean didn't diminish it. The doubt came surging back stronger than ever if he managed to find even a moment of peace without it. 

He knew what it was. Of course he did. He'd seen good men go down under the weight of post-traumatic stress. The thoughts never left him - Joe dead, his father's funeral, his mother struggling to speak in her final moments. Images materialized before him whether awake or asleep, impossible to predict or banish. And now, Danny's shock-cold body pressed against him on the way to the hospital, the scent and seeping wetness of blood, to be replayed a thousand times, clawing at the wisdom of every decision he'd made for the last ten years. 

His phone buzzed in his pocket, and then subsided; the waves rolled closer up the beach, and then away, and Steve doubled down on what had to be done, because no one he loved could ever be safe while he was in their lives. He'd known it for years, but had crystalized for him when he'd felt Danny's heart slowing beneath his hand. 

It was time to go. He was no use to anyone like this. 

\--

After a couple hours of fitful sleep and a quick shower, Steve went back to the hospital at oh-dark-thirty, because that was the only place he wanted to be until Danny was better - or at least, healed enough to be discharged and looked after at home. The nurses, who knew the team well enough to bring them hand-selected snacks and coffee by this point, didn't bat an eye when they saw Steve re-appear so soon in the ICU. They just ushered him back in to Danny's room and handed him a blanket. 

Steve made himself comfortable in the same chair he'd been in a few hours before, but he put the spare blanket over Danny's feet, in case he was cold. 

"How's he doing?" he whispered to one of the nurses, when she came around to check Danny's vitals. 

"The more rest he gets, the better," she said with a smile. "He tossed and turned for a while right after you went home to change. He seems to sleep better when you're here." 

She said as though it was obvious, as though she knew that was why he couldn't stay away. She wasn't wrong. He covered Danny's hand with his own and settled in, dozing on and off through the long night. 

Lou stopped by around 7am and stood beside the bed with Steve in silence, watching Danny, for several minutes. Then he handed Steve a gym bag. "Wasn't sure you would have gone home to shower, so I brought a change of clothes," he said quietly. "Kind of surprised to see you did, but that's good. Now let's go get something to eat."

"I'm not-"

"I'm sorry, did I give you the impression I give a damn whether you're hungry?" Lou's big hand settled on Steve's shoulder. "Oatmeal, a muffin, a banana, don't care, you're putting something in that belly before I leave." 

Reluctantly, Steve nodded, and set the bag on the chair to mark his place. 

Downstairs in the tiny hospital café, Steve grabbed a carton of milk, two oranges, and a cup of coffee. Lou chose coffee and oatmeal, and they sat down together near the windows, where sunlight was streaming over the tables. 

"Junior and Tani are running down the last of Daiyu Mei's crew," Lou said, sprinkling a packet of brown sugar over his oatmeal. "Lincoln and Quinn have her in the box, sweating her a little. Just seeing if she can cough up anything useful before she's arraigned." 

"Great," Steve said, though he didn't give a fuck. Every time he looked at Danny's swollen, bruised face, he wanted nothing more than to drive over to HQ and put a bullet between Daiyu Mei's eyes, honor be damned. He spun one of the oranges idly on the tabletop, and said, "I need you to handle the day to day operations for now." 

"Can do," Lou said. "Anything you need, Steve. We're all here for you and Danny, you know that." 

"I do know, Lou, thank you." He cleared his throat, and turned his face toward the sun for a moment, letting it warm his skin. "I also need you to know that once Danny's out of danger, I'm taking a leave of absence." 

"I'm sure Danny'll appreciate the help, even if he bitches about it," Lou said, chuckling. 

Steve frowned, and after a moment said, "Sorry, I wasn't clear. I'll stay until he's up and around, and then I'm leaving Hawaii for a while." Once the words were out, he looked back at Lou's stunned expression. "I need some time to clear my head." 

"Clear your head? What the hell kind of nonsense is that? You can't think this is your fault," Lou said, in that way he had of getting straight to the heart of things. 

Steve opened the milk carton, toyed with the cardboard lip, and pinched it shut again. "I had already decided to do this, before Danny...before he was taken. I just need some time away."

"Does he know?" Lou asked, putting his spoon down slowly, the oatmeal forgotten. 

"No. Once I've got him home, when he's stronger, I'll tell him."

"He is not gonna understand. Hell, I don't understand," Lou said, incredulous. "Why now?"

"Because it has to be now," Steve said. "And I need you to leave it be, Lou. Please. I'll tell everyone in my own time." 

"Steve, you know I have your back, but...man, this is crazy." 

"Okay, you've said your piece," Steve said. "I hear you. But this is how it has to be. I don't want to discuss it." He picked up the orange and pushed his chair back. "I need to get back up there." 

He left Lou staring after him, all his questions unanswered on the table between them, because he needed to make sure Danny wasn't alone while he was vulnerable. He made a promise to himself right then - that he'd be there for as long as Danny needed him, and that when Danny was recovered, he'd go. No dragging his feet. 

When he got to the door of Danny's room, Danny was blinking himself awake, like a mole poking his head out of a deep burrow. The sight of it made Steve smile. "Hey, Danno," he said. He set the orange on the bedside table and sat down, grabbing Danny's hand in the process. 

"That's more like it," Danny said, smiling a little in return. Then he winced, as the smile pulled at his split lip. "Ow, cuts."

"At least you can feel 'em today," Steve said. 

"Oh believe me, I could feel 'em yesterday too," Danny mumbled. "Wait, was it yesterday?"

Steve squeezed Danny's hand. "Yep. Been a long few days." 

Danny squeezed back. 

They sat together for a while, not talking, until Danny drifted off to sleep again. Steve dragged the chair closer to the bed, and hunkered down for a nap, with his arm resting against Danny's on the bed - as much contact as he could get away with, without the nurses scolding him. 

For the next week, Steve alternated half-days of work and spending time with Danny. Steve kicked his ass at kids' card games ("Go fish, you miserable son of a - have you always been such a lying cheater? Why am I surprised, you never follow rules of any kind, why would cards be any different?"), or fetched paperbacks from the gift shop when Rachel and Charlie were there, so they could have private time. 

"I know we came very close to losing him," Rachel said to Steve in the hallway one afternoon, while Grace FaceTimed from her dorm room with Danny and Charlie. "I can tell because of how you are with him now."

"How's that?" Steve asked absently. He leaned against the doorframe, arms crossed, drinking in the sight of Danny laughing and Charlie snuggling into his side. There was nothing better than the soft, pure joy in Danny's eyes when he looked at his kids.

"Like I used to be when we were first married," Rachel said. "Unable to take my eyes off him for a single moment after he'd been hurt, because if I looked away, he might disappear." 

The truth of what she was saying had settled into Steve's bones years ago; that protectiveness of each other had always been part of what made him and Danny close. It wasn't all that strange that Rachel understood it, too. "He come home hurt a lot back then?" Steve asked, because it was easier than unpacking her comparison, and because he could never get enough uncensored info about Danny's pre-Hawaii life. Danny parceled his history out like state secrets, probably in retaliation for all the 'it's classifieds' and 'I can neither confirm nor denys' Steve had been forced to inflict on him over the years. 

"He was never reckless, but he was rather single-minded," she answered, smiling into the distance at what Steve assumed was some private memory of young Daniel Williams, full of fire and eager to prove himself. "It wasn't until Grace was born that he began to pivot away from the more dangerous aspects of the job. There were some scares from time to time, but nothing on a scale of what's happened since he's been with the task force."

He looked at Danny, who right from the start had been the voice of reason in the face of Steve's temper and corner-cutting, and then back to Rachel, stricken. "Rachel, I-"

"I'm not blaming you for Danny's injuries," she said quickly. "There's nothing that could ever have persuaded him to give up this work, save perhaps to be with the children. And besides, he hasn't been accountable to me in years. Nor does he listen to my opinion." She moved closer, tucked herself under Steve's arm, and he hugged her close. "Love does exact a heavy toll, sometimes." 

Danny glanced up from the tablet just then and saw the two of them standing together in the doorway. He looked from Rachel, to Steve, and got that goofy, soft smile on his face, the one Steve had worked for the better part of ten years to bring out in one way or another. He was helpless in the face of Danny's happiness, considering how hard it was to come by. "Worth it, though," he said, as Rachel looped her arm around his waist. 

The team was there every day, and as Danny improved, they stayed longer, bringing love and laughter with them to brighten the sterile hospital room. Cards poured in from people Danny had saved or helped, from co-workers and friends, and even a couple of ex-girlfriends -- a veritable sea of good wishes to help with the healing. Steve made sure they were tacked to the walls and propped up on tables, where Danny could see them whenever he was awake. 

Lou said nothing more to Steve about his plans, but he side-eyed Steve when he thought Steve wasn't looking. It didn't matter; as long as he kept his mouth shut until Steve could explain to Danny, everything was good. 

Every night, Danny reached for his hand after his evening meds - casually, like it was part of their regular routine. Steve sat by Danny's bed each evening until Danny was asleep - and even then, for an hour or so more - and then slowly, slowly, would force himself to untangle his fingers from Danny's and drive home to sit on the lanai, listening to the ocean for hours. Sometimes, when his brain wouldn't shut off, he walked into the dark, unwelcoming waves and swam furiously away from shore, until the lights from the house had all but disappeared and he was treading water, alone with the harsh sounds of his own breath. 

He still needed to make plans, book flights, but he couldn't bring himself to think about that until he was able to bring Danny home and be sure he was looked after. 

Two weeks after the surgery, Danny got the all-clear. "You sure, doc?" Steve asked, already rubber-banding Danny's cards and books into neat piles for packing. "He's good to go?"

"Absolutely. There's some self-monitoring he'll have to continue, and I'd like to do follow-up outpatient aftercare for a few months. The damage to your lung bears watching until you're completely healed due to the number of complications that can still arise. I'm also concerned about those contusions along your spine. Be sure to use your cane to take pressure off when you can. But overall, you're doing well."

"That's a relief," Danny said, glancing up at Steve. "I'd hate to see what doing not so well looks like." 

Steve smiled, but it was hard to look at Danny trying to be stoic about his pain, and not hear the voice in the back of his head, insistent that this was his fault. He shoved his hands in his pockets, and focused attentively as the doctor droned on about meds. 

The team showed up to move Danny home - Steve's home, because no way was he staying anywhere else while he recuperated, that wasn't even a discussion - and filled Steve's fridge with groceries, now that Steve wouldn't have a reason to object to it. Predictably, Danny wouldn't accept help for much - he tried to talk Junior out of moving out (to Tani's, Steve thought, though Junior didn't say), because he felt like a jerk for taking the room. He wouldn't let Steve steady him when he was in the shower (not that Steve listened at all to Danny's objections; he just stood outside the door and hovered, instead), and he tried to change his own bandages. 

Steve won on the bandage issue the first night, when the amount of hissing and groaning from the guest bedroom finally forced him to intervene. "Stop, hey," he said, rounding the corner into the bedroom, and stopped dead. He'd seen the wound before, but Danny was aggravating it with all the tugging and pulling, and it took him back to the car ride all over again, Danny's blood on his hands, the pressure pack sodden with Danny's life rushing out. He looked down at his hands; they were shaking, but they were still useful. He'd worked through worse. "Would you just, here, let me," he said, and took the sterile dressing away.

Danny was quiet while Steve bandaged him, doing his best to be gentle. It was Danny's silence that was unnerving. Usually they had no end of things to say to each other, but not since they'd left the hospital. "Thanks," Danny said, touching Steve's hand lightly, then pulling away, too fast. 

"You're welcome." Steve stowed the leftover gauze and scissors in the bathroom, then braced himself on the sink and took a few deep breaths, thinking about the way Danny had hesitated to touch him. He heard Danny shifting around on the bed, and when he left the bathroom, Danny was stretched out on his side, his eyes tracking Steve's movements. 

Steve sat down on the other side of the bed, and before he could talk himself out of it, curled up on his side behind Danny. He stared at the bandage he'd just put there on Danny's back, pristine and white, and reached out to smooth the tape at the edges. 

"Steve," Danny said, voice cracking. 

Steve pressed his hand gently against Danny's bare back, as if he could erase the hurt just by touch. He sat up then, kicked his shoes off, and turned off the light, and then lay back down, closer than before. He didn't ask permission, just pulled the blanket up over them both and curled himself around Danny, his chest to Danny's bare back, one arm draped loosely over his waist. And then, because he'd lost his mind and knew there was no chance of stopping now, he buried his nose against Danny's skin, near the bandage. 

He expected something - a verbal barrage, an objection, a joke - but instead Danny just sighed, and his body relaxed, like all he'd been waiting for was for Steve to hold him. It was ridiculous, this wasn't how they handled things - it wasn't anything Danny would ever have allowed, before - but the last time he'd held Danny, he hadn't been sure Danny would live through the next few minutes. In all the days between, he'd been holding on, but he couldn't get close enough. He needed more. 

Danny curled into himself, making a soft gasp of pain, and Steve whispered, "You okay? You need a painkiller?"

"I'm good." A pause, and then, "A little cold, maybe." 

Steve reached down and pulled the blanket all the way up. "Better?"

"Just stay right there," Danny said, soft. "You run warm." 

Steve closed his eyes, and tightened his arm around Danny, resting one palm flat on Danny's bandaged chest. In the morning, he might kick himself, but he was so tired, and he was going to let himself have this moment. They were safe, and maybe that was all he had any right to ask for, after everything. It would have to be enough. 

\--

Steve left Danny sleeping peacefully when he went back to work before dawn the next morning, and made it his mission not to be at home much during the next few days. As a result, Five-0 picked up a bunch of cases that would normally be beneath their notice. Steve wanted them busy, so they created their own busy-work, running down petty crooks and helping out HPD with some cold cases. They were all vibrating with how much they wanted to talk to him about this turn of events, but their number one Steve-whisperer was out of commission, and he didn't stand still long enough to give them any openings. 

In the evenings, he grilled steaks, or did the dishes, or the laundry, or any number of other mundane house tasks while telling Danny about the nothing cases. Danny listened, and sometimes he nodded off in the middle, drooping over his iced tea. After dinner, they sat on the lanai with Longboards (Steve) and more tea (Danny), watching the ocean, barely speaking. Steve knew those silences were his fault. There was so much he couldn't say, he was choking on it. He didn't dare touch Danny, because each touch was a tether he would have to break. And finally, on the evening he saw Danny coming downstairs without the cane, he knew his time had run out, and he had to get it over with. 

They were down by the beach, Danny stretched out comfortably watching the sunset, when Steve said, "You remember when you asked me what was going on with me, a while back?"

"Hard to forget that conversation, even after anesthesia and drugs." Danny picked at a rough patch of wood on the arm of his chair. "Think you said you weren't sure what you wanted, anymore." 

Steve nodded, searching Danny's face for...something, he wasn't sure. Encouragement? Approval? It wasn't there. Just the curious, patient expression he used on skittish suspects. Steve pushed on, anyway. "Been thinking about it a lot, so. I'm going to do some traveling, for a while. Starting in Peru, probably. There's some stuff there I've always wanted to see."

"Wow, Steve McGarrett has a bucket list," Danny said, smiling faintly. "Will wonders never cease."

"Maybe you inspired me with the list of things that would make you happy." 

"It was a short list back then." Danny met his eyes. "Even shorter now." 

Steve's heart was racing. "It's just something I've got to do, Danny. I know...I'm sure it seems crazy, or the timing is really bad."

"Two for two," Danny said. "I don't get it, Steve. You have everything here. Friends who love you, a team that you love, and you have Eddie, who if you were ever looking for unconditional love, there it is." He stopped, and turned his face away, and it was all Steve could do not to haul Danny out of that chair and fold him up in his arms. He knew Danny probably better than anyone alive, even his kids and his parents, and so he knew that he was always waiting for the moment that people would leave him and happiness would turn sour. He'd had his own run of tragedy to reinforce that point of view; Steve didn't have a corner on the market. 

"This is my home," Steve said slowly. "It's always going to be the place I come back to. I just need to do this, for myself."

"You know, if you want to be away from...us, I can move back to my-"

"No," Steve said sharply. "No, Danno. That's not it. You're welcome here. I want you here." 

"But you don't want to be here." Danny still wasn't looking at him. 

"This isn't..." Steve stopped himself mid-sentence, because what he was about to say - it's not about you -- was a lie. It _was_ about Danny. And about the others. Only, not in the way they would ever understand. He ran through a dozen different ways to explain in his head, and none of them were what he wanted Danny to know. Frustrated and tongue-tied, he slouched down in the chair and put his head back to stare up at the purple sky. 

There was no way to explain the terror he'd felt when he saw Danny on the ground. No point in trying to explain that leaving now was the hardest, most important thing he was ever going to do. 

Danny said, "I want you to be happy, of course I want that for you. I just can't see how giving up everything you love, literally everything, can do that for you. I see how you are when you're chasing a suspect or beating the shit out of a terrorist, Steve, that crazed look of pure determined joy you get on your face. That hasn't changed. I see how you light up when everybody barrels through your door for poker night, or-"

"I'm slowing down," Steve said suddenly. That much, at least, was true, even if it was hard to admit. "I'm...there's a lot of damage over these miles. Getting so that it's easier to shoot suspects than go to blows."

"Well, it was always easier, it just wasn't as much fun for you." 

Steve huffed a smile, and tried to catch Danny's eye, but Danny still wasn't looking at him. "Something I learned in BUD/S, that the mind has to be right, every part of performance is all in the mind. And my head isn't in the game right now. You know it, Danny. I know you've seen it." 

Danny nodded slowly, and sighed, and finally turned back to Steve. "Does it matter that I want you to stay?"

"It matters," Steve said, holding his gaze. "It matters a hell of a lot." 

"But you're still going." Not a question; not even a need for Steve to nod his answer. 

Danny nodded, instead, and then he braced his cane in the sand and stood. Without another word, he made his way slowly back up to the house. 

From next door, Steve heard the sounds of a TV blaring, adults laughing and dishes clanking, everyday life going on as usual. He listened to it until the trembling in his hands stopped, and he knew it was safe to follow Danny back to the house, where the chasm he'd just opened between them would swallow him up in its silence. 

\--

He hadn't sent for Catherine, was the thing. That part of his life was over. They were too alike, and that was how he'd finally understood it would never work. The long absences, the all-consuming mission. The duty to her country, and to those who needed her help. When he thought about her now, it was usually when he'd had a hard week and was questioning all those insane life choices he'd made. She was safe, comfortable. Familiar. 

So when she sat down beside him on the plane, and took his offered hand, he had a moment of regretting that he'd shared so much with Lincoln about what Catherine meant to him. 

"Lincoln was a little confused about your abrupt leave of absence," she said, reading it all over his face. Her too-perceptive gaze was lingering on the shadows under his eyes, and she didn't bother to hide that she didn't like what she was seeing. 

"Did he, uh, did he share a lot of stuff I said that I probably shouldn't have?" Steve asked, with a tired smile. 

"Quite possibly," she said, with an answering smile. "He knows you well enough to care about you, but he doesn't know you well enough yet not to interfere in your choices."

"Yeah. I'm sure he meant well." 

"I can," Catherine gestured to the front of the plane, "see myself out, if you would rather go alone." 

The idea of having that conversation - of trying to explain why he was leaving in the first place, and why he needed the time away - was exhausting. He hadn't even managed to get his own arms around the problem. If she stayed, they'd have to talk sooner or later - about their own unfinished business, for a start.

He chased his answer around in his own head for so long that Cath was subtly unbuckling her seatbelt with one hand and preparing to leave him in peace. He squeezed her hand and said, "Come with. For a little while." 

"Best offer I've had today," she said, with a little grin. She was treating him softly, he knew; the hard questions would come later, after she'd evaluated how much damage there was for her to work around. He was too tired to think ahead to that. It was enough that she'd cared enough to be there for him. 

As the plane began to taxi, Steve's phone dinged at him again. He pulled it from his pocket. Nestled beneath Danny's first text - _miss you already_ \- was a second message: 

_Eddie misses you too_

He looked out the window for a long moment, until the brilliant pink sunset and the jetway and the ground crew faded into each other, a wet blur, and then toggled the phone into airplane mode for the flight ahead.


	2. Chapter 2

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Self-examination, umbrella drinks, residual trauma, tourism, important conversations, hard truths delivered by good friends, and a bit of pining.

Steve hadn't planned to do anything other than sack out during his flights, and he kept to the plan, save for a short conversation with Cath about how well Danny was recovering, and a brief acknowledgement that he hadn't thought much ahead past wheels-up and leaving the island. It felt like a briefing - the basics in preparation for a mission - and like most other missions, the only things to do on the way were think, or sleep to avoid thinking. It wasn't his job to entertain Cath; he knew she was good with that. Too much time had passed for small talk without groundwork. 

Once they landed in Peru, Catherine checked them into separate rooms at the Lima Hilton, and Steve watched her handle it all with smooth efficiency - getting upgrades out of the desk clerk in that way she had of making the guy feel like she was doing him a favor by letting him help. Steve took his key and wobbled to his room, thinking about texting Danny the entire time and talking himself out of it. He'd known it would be hard, but he hadn't been prepared for how much he wanted to hear Danny's voice. There wouldn't be a cure for it. Not for a while, anyway. He automatically shied away from any false promises to himself - even the reassuring kind he'd offered Danny, in his own awkward way. 

_It's not forever - you know that, right?_

The water was hot, which helped to unknot his muscles; he wasn't used to sleeping pretzeled-up in commercial plane seats. It was easier to flop out on a bench or the floor of a military hop. Once he was showered, he stretched out on the bed and tried to catch a couple hours of sleep, but he was still restless. 

He missed his comfortable mattress, and the sound of the ocean, and the scent of flowers blooming in the humid air. He missed Tani's loud laugh and Adam's nervous energy, Junior's calm presence and Lou's hard-earned pearls of wisdom; he missed Eddie settling over his legs to watch TV. Most of all, he missed Danny winding up to lecture him about any random thing, the pattern of their lives together, arguments and beers and being there in all the worst moments of their lives, and Danny reaching for his hand every night, like it was the easiest thing in the world. 

Steve was too exhausted to hit the gym, so he curled up on his side and watched the numbers tick by on the bedside clock until it was time to join Catherine for dinner. 

When they met at the rooftop bar, Cath was beautiful as always, effortlessly so, in cargo pants and a faded green T-shirt that spoke to how fast she'd shoved clothes into a bag and left once Lincoln called her. It made him grateful and sad, in equal measure. He'd caused a lot of stress for the people who cared about him. He'd have to try hard to make up for that, when he was able to. 

"I talked to the front desk," she said, sipping from a glass of deep red wine. "We're booked on a jungle trek - five days up, and then a car ride down. He's going to do a workaround for the permits. Military discount, with a big tip."

"Beautiful." Steve toasted her efforts with a tip of his coffee cup. It was going to be pretty strange hiking through a jungle without being in pursuit of someone, or ducking gunshots, or any of the other disasters that generally accompanied his journeys in the tropics. He was looking forward to earning the view at Machu Picchu. "How long can you stay?"

"Depends on what you're planning to get up to next." She smiled. "I've already seen a lot of jungles."

"I was just thinking that," Steve said, grinning. "But they're usually infested with terrorists and cartels, not the ruins of great civilizations."

"Sometimes both," she said. "Sometimes the ruins are new." 

"True enough." It was sobering, how many times both of them had watched the destruction of places they'd come to know, and places they'd barely had a chance to see. 

"We're in separate rooms for the rest of this trip, then?" she asked, looking at him over the rim of her glass. No dancing around it this time. She'd always been willing to be there for him before, when he stumbled, when he was hurting, even when he needed someone to do ugly, dirty work with him - if she was in a position to help. All he had to do was call. 

Times change, though, and he'd become used to her not being there - and to someone else who always was. 

Somewhere on the other side of the world, Danny was probably taking a painkiller and having a doctor-disapproved beer because Steve wasn't there to pluck it out of his hand. He was probably hurting in all kinds of ways, and trying not to text Steve because he respected Steve's decision to leave, and the thought of it was both comforting, and hard to bear. 

He stared into the depths of his coffee cup. "I think that's wise, don't you?"

Catherine nodded slowly and said, "Guess that depends on the expectations, but...we're about to clear the decks, aren't we?"

"'Fraid so," Steve said. All the things he'd wanted to say to her years ago, the things he'd held bottled inside like shards of seaglass in a jar, seemed so much less urgent now that so many years had passed. But there were still remnants rattling around in there that shouldn't be left unspoken, and he'd known for a very long time what needed saying. 

She kicked her feet up underneath her. Anyone walking by would have thought she was relaxed, a tourist beginning a leisurely vacation, but Steve could see the tension in every line of her body as she said, "I expected this talk a few years ago, but I guess maybe I pre-empted it when I said I needed to be needed outside of a relationship, didn't I?" 

"Well, it was going to be a different kind of talk before we parted company for good," he answered. "And then when we saw each other after that, I had other business on my mind, and there just didn't seem like much point. We needed different things, and we weren't going to be together." 

"Steve," she said, and put her hand on his arm. Light as a feather. "Part of me thought there'd be a point where things would change for me, or for you, or we'd both stop. I don't know if I truly realized that might not happen. Or that we might not stop at the same point in time." 

Steve nodded. "I always thought," he said haltingly, "that if we set everything else aside for a minute, all the distractions - that we'd be good together. That it would all take shape and make sense."

"But the moment never came," Catherine said. Steve felt a surge of fondness for her, and for all the things about her that had made him love her in the first place. 

"The thing is, it did. At least, it did for me, and you were not in a place where you could stop and settle and see if we could carve out some kind of life together. And for a long time, I kept thinking, someday we'll try again, the timing was off. But that was never it, was it? I mean, that wasn't all of it."

"No. That wasn't all of it." She set her glass down and clasped her hands together, rubbing her thumb against her palm in circles. An old nervous habit. "I loved you, Steve, so much, but I have never been able to stay long in one place, or resist a challenge. You understand it, I know you do. It's one of the things that made you so hard to resist all those years ago. We were more alike than different." 

"And now that's reversed." 

"The core things are still the same. We love our country and our jobs. We bonded over the thrill of doing them well." It was what she didn't say: not, _we love our friends. Our family._ She'd put it the same way Steve would have said it a decade ago, before he'd developed an acute and incurable case of ohana. 

It struck him then that the constant drive of moving from difficult job to even more difficult job had hardened her subtly, something he understood at his core. Her duty - being useful, solving the big problems - would be the most important thing in her life until she couldn't do it anymore. He'd been headed down that path ten years ago, becoming more of a mission-driven machine than a person. But she still had balance; she was far from that point of veering off into the shadows of self-doubt, and there was no weariness for the mission written in her eyes. 

It was strange, how he'd held her, made love to her, integrated her into his team for a while, thought about marrying her, shared every damn thing with her for years, trusted her with his secrets, and now he couldn't read her anymore. How it could be possible that he'd lost touch with who Cath was, and yet could read Danny's mind with barely a glance at his face, he had no idea. That was one of the things that prompted him to go on. 

He reached out and took her hand. "It happened so fast, Cath. I found a family, and then their families became my family, and suddenly I was a part of things I'd never dreamed I could be." He paused, and pushed himself to say the rest: "Things I wanted once, with you." 

She said nothing, but she was listening intently, and it gave him the space to say the rest of it out loud. "I've lost too much, I guess. What's left is starting to become too precious to risk. Your life is all about risk, and I accept that - because I get it. I worry for you, of course I do. But there are a lot of others in my life who didn't sign up for the risk - not this kind of risk, anyway."

"I know how important they are to you," Cath said. "They're wonderful people. I love them, too." 

Steve shook his head, because he didn't like the implication of her words - the comparison she wasn't quite making, and the caution with which she said it. 

How in the hell could he ever explain that he'd almost come undone when Danny'd been taken, and that he couldn't reconcile his own feelings about it? Love was...so much more complicated than he'd imagined, when he'd bought her a ring and hoped it would fit. 

"It's different," he said, choosing his own words carefully as well. "You're important to me. But there's no foundation for us anymore, Cath, you know that, right?" 

"I was always afraid that if we spent time together with nothing to pull us...to pull _me_ away, we might find out some truths about what made us work together in the first place," she said softly, tucking her hair behind her ear. "And now here you are, having put all the pieces together without either of us having to go through that exercise." 

"Yeah." When Steve looked at her, he could see the young officer she'd been the first time he asked her out, and the incredible woman she was now, all bundled into one remarkable person. "I'd say I was sorry, but...like you pointed out before, we were friends first. Always."

"We don't do those kinds of apologies, you and me," she said, raising her eyebrow at him. "I've had more to be sorry about over the years than you have, I think. Plus, there's no one I'd rather hike a dangerous jungle trail with, just so you know." They both laughed, connected in all the ways that still counted, always. 

He let go of her hand, his smile fading. "I know you're letting me off the hook, here."

"Just returning the favor." She smoothed the skin between his eyebrows with her thumb until he stopped frowning. Then she ordered another glass of wine, and they moved on, because it was what they knew how to do. They'd both had a lifetime of practice, even if Steve was never quite as good at it as he pretended to be. 

They had dinner there in the bar, mostly in comfortable silence, because they'd used up the conversation quotient on the hard stuff. It was good that they'd actually talked it through, but settling things with Cath left him wrung out. He excused himself early to swim some laps around the pool and run a couple miles, nothing in his head for the moment - just movement, making his body tired so his mind might follow. 

That night he crawled into the too-soft hotel bed, propped up on too-hard pillows, and texted Danny. _In Peru. Gonna travel a while. All good. Miss you._

A moment later, the answer: _what is it with you and jungles?_ \-- and then, _miss you too_

Steve smiled, and fell asleep with the phone pressed to his chest. 

***

They spent two weeks hiking near and to Machu Picchu, sometimes following a guide they'd hired with some of the hard-earned pay they'd socked away over the years and had never had a chance to spend. Steve still felt a little badly about that morning they broke off to take an unsanctioned side hike, giving the poor guy a heart attack when they reappeared at the camp site hours later, but it was worth it for all the beauty they'd seen without the chatter of other tourists. It was good to be alone with the smell of the earth, and the sounds of their movement, and the birds having conversations overhead. 

Life was starting to regain a little color. The corners of his brain that had always helped him sift information began unlocking. If he was really lucky, pretty soon his decisions would begin to seem less impossible, and more like pleasant choices again. Steve snapped a picture or two of the tree cover, because he wanted to give Danny something to roll his eyes about when he had a cell signal again. 

Machu Picchu was everything it was advertised to be, and Steve had a moment of perfect awe standing on a mountain trail above the city, looking down at it...right before the hollow feeling crept back beneath his breastbone. 

That night, Steve called Danny from the bed and breakfast in Cusco. Danny picked up on the third ring, and said, "Hello, stranger." 

"Hi," Steve said. His hand was shaking, so he transferred the phone to his left hand, and realized that hand was shaking, too. He tucked the phone between his shoulder and ear and rolled onto his side. "It's great to hear your voice. How you doin'? You healing up okay?"

"I'm good," Danny said, "except for this alpha male you put on our team while you are off running up the sides of mountains. I think he thought he was in charge, Steven. I had to set him straight." 

"You're back working?" Steve frowned into the pillow. "What the hell, Danny? You were barely able to stand up on your own in the mornings, when I left." 

"Idle hands et cetera. I'm perfectly capable of standing around with the rest of them at HQ. It's been quiet, anyway. No new major crises since..." He trailed off.

Steve swallowed and said, "So, uh, Cole is fitting in great, then?"

"Oh, he's a regular joy to behold as he busts through doors and shoots people. Reminds me of you ten years ago, which by the way I do not mean as a compliment. Doesn't like to take orders much, which is not surprising to me at all, but he's settling down." 

"Good, glad to hear it. He's a good man," Steve said. "He'll be great in tough situations, you'll see."

"Time will tell," Danny said, every word dripping skepticism. "What about you? How's the jungle? Which, by the way, looked exactly the same as every other jungle." 

Steve opened his mouth to make a smart reply, and instead he said, "I miss you like hell, man." 

He could hear Danny breathing on the other end of the line, before he said, "There's a cure for that." 

Steve closed his eyes, and pictured Danny standing there in shirtsleeves and slacks in his office, everything else on hold around him while the two of them reached out for each other. "Got a few things to sort out, still," he said, and then, "I'll be in touch," because if he talked to Danny for even a minute more, he might get on the next plane back, and he wasn't ready. 

"Yeah, okay. Hey, take care of yourself, yeah?" Now Danny sounded worried, which was the opposite of what Steve wanted. He'd never had any luck at persuading Danny not to worry, or to believe he was fine, even when he really was. 

He realized he'd let the silence go too long; he could practically hear Danny on the other end of the phone vibrating with concern. "Danny, I'm...everything is okay. You take care, too. We'll talk soon." 

He ended the call and slid the phone to the other side of the bed, and stared at it until he fell asleep. 

That night, he dreamed Danny was curled under the sheets facing him, watching him with shadowed eyes. Steve tried to speak, but he couldn't make a sound. 

**

From Peru, they headed off to Bali - Catherine's choice, Steve's treat. As she was scrolling through potential hotels on her phone looking for last-minute deals, Steve said, "I always thought Bali was for honeymoons, I had no idea normal people went there to do non-honeymoon things."

"Honeymoons? You've given this some thought?" she asked, giving him a look. 

"Well, you know. Before." He scrubbed a hand over his face, which unfortunately didn't erase what he'd already said. 

"Since you're paying for it, and you're temporarily out of work, let's share a hut," Catherine said, eyeing him with a shark grin. "Apparently I can trust you to keep your hands to yourself." 

So they did, and it was a very nice hut, out over the brilliant blue water. The entire place radiated tranquility. "That bed is as big as a small nation," Steve marveled, before turning resolutely away to the hammock on the terrace, which Cath was more than happy to allow him to sleep in. 

They spent the remaining two weeks of Cath's leave in the sunshine, swimming and relaxing, catching up on all the classified, dangerous, and or/stupid things they'd done in the year they hadn't seen each other. They showed each other new scars; they shared drinks and relived ancient adventures that had lost their edges as the years had passed. It was good to have that common history, because they were kindred souls, no matter what else they might never be from that point forward. 

There was a moment, maybe two days in, when Steve realized every story he'd told that morning was about Danny, or Grace, or Charlie, or all three of them in some combination. He broke off in the middle of a sentence; a moment later, Cath handed him her umbrella drink, and gestured to the bartender for another. "Drink up, it's good for you," she said. "Did I ever tell you about the time I bartered two earrings, a watch and an ancient Kalashnikov for a noisy goat and an RPG?"

He took the umbrella out and stuck it in the sand, then chugged the drink. "That's a story I have to hear," he said, and settled back in the chair, grateful in ways he would never be able to express to her, while she described the prize goat - and the uses for the RPG - in loving detail. 

Days were good, but he was starting to dread the nights, because sharing a hut also meant sharing more about his current state of mind than Steve had bargained for. Every night, he woke from increasingly nasty versions of the same dream - Danny covered in blood, Danny dead in his arms, Steve too late to do anything to stop it. 

"Just a dream," he'd gasp, when Catherine bolted out to the terrace at his shouts, and hovered near, looking for the threat. "He's safe now, it's okay, they won't come for him anymore." He knew he was reassuring himself, not her; Cath wasn't easily alarmed, but she radiated concern after every one of his nightmares. Rather than share things he might regret, he locked himself in the bathroom or went for a midnight swim before Cath had a chance to ask a single one of her sharp, insightful questions. The dreams were bad, but Cath seeing the state he was in because of them was far worse. 

Late one of those nights, she was waiting on the terrace for him when he emerged from the ocean. He stopped like a deer in headlights when he saw her sitting on the steps to the beach; he knew from experience, there was no escape from that determined look on her face. Without preamble, she said, "You're a hard learner, aren't you? I thought about what I could possibly say to you this time, that I hadn't already said. But we talked about choice once before, and about guilt, and what we do for the people we love, and maybe you didn't hear me the last time." 

There was no subject on earth, not a single one, that Steve wanted to discuss less than he wanted to revisit Joe's death, or the aftermath. He took the towel she offered him, and wiped his face with it, stalling for time. She sat motionless, giving him the gift of her silence, and the opportunity to tell her so many things - but he wasn't about to open that wound. Finally, he said, "We talked about taking a bullet for the people we love, and that's fine for me and you, but -"

"You missed the part about choice, I guess?" She stood up and came to stand next to him at the railing. "As long as I've known you, you've been carrying so much baggage, Steve. All this pain over failing to save people. Do you think-" She broke off, and pressed her lips together for a second. Steve considered taking advantage of the pause to bolt back into the ocean, but she would outwait him forever, so he stood his ground. "Do you really think any person who's ever fought with you, bled with you, has a moment's regret about it, no matter the cost? Because if you do, you're so very wrong." She slipped behind him and hugged his shoulders. "Try to hear me, Steve, please," she said. "You're not going to move past this until you let yourself believe it's not your fault." She patted his arm, and then she went inside, and slid the doors closed. 

The moment she was inside, Steve locked every bit of what she'd said in a tightly sealed box, to examine at some far future point, when the dreams about Danny, or the memory of Joe's pointless death, didn't make him want to scratch off his own skin. 

For a day or two after that, he and Cath didn't talk much. She seemed to sense he was too raw for it, and she gave him a wide berth. They eased back into sharing bits and pieces of their lives as unconnected anecdotes each evening at the beach bar, with the tiki torches glowing and the starlight glittering. With all the small talk, the sting of her blunt reminder faded some, though Steve found that box of fear and guilt inside his head wasn't locked as tight as he'd thought. He concentrated on the twilight sky, and the sound of Cath's voice, and the ocean breeze across his skin. 

So much about Bali was like home, but different enough from it that he didn't feel that tight ball of anxiety in his throat. 

"So tell me more about how the McGarrett residence has turned into a boarding house and kennel," Catherine teased him, the edges of her blue sarong fluttering in the faint evening breeze. "You still have that long list of unofficial house rules?"

"It's not a boarding house, okay, it's just that - I have all that room, why not share it? Junior was in a tough spot, and then Danny's piece of crap house started flooding out of every pipe, and I couldn't say no." He kept a straight face, thinking of how Danny had tried and failed to lie when Steve asked what kind of incompetent plumber took two months to fix a sewer line. "Anyway, Junior's moving in with Tani, so it's a moot point."

"There's still Danny," she said, taking a sip from her exceedingly blue frothy drink, which was probably pure rum. "Or doesn't his living there count as having a guest?"

"He's recovering; he needs stability. I told him he should just bulldoze that shithole he's continuously remodeling and start over. He's thinking about it." 

"You like having him there." Catherine made a sad face at the waiter, who immediately scurried over with a fresh drink, even though hers was still full. "Have you told him so?"

"What? No. That'd be like, I don't know, like-"

"An invitation to stay?"

Steve made scoffing noises at her. "He's been invited. He knows that. He was welcome from day one, he doesn't have to ask. Even though he does once in a while, so I can give him crap about it and make him do extra chores. It's polite." Steve looked out at the dark expanse of ocean, thinking of the view from the beach behind his home. It comforted him, thinking about Danny in that home, safe in his space. Their space, more or less; it was Danny's home now, too. Danny's stuff was in the kitchen, the living room, the spare bedroom, every nook and cranny. 

Sometimes he thought about the number of times Danny had stayed with him between rentals, or recuperated in his home, over the last ten years. Not like Steve was responsible for the excessive amount of recuperations; the stories Danny (and Rachel) had shared made it clear he'd been a risk-taker long before Steve had made him see the light of that truth. But it was taking its toll. Danny was slower too these days, less likely to run into danger. More thoughtful about it; more likely to spend his free time staring at a sunset ocean with the daylight melting into it, and fall asleep in a beach chair. Steve liked that. He liked it a lot, providing the place and the safety and the comfort for Danny to rest. 

The moonlight caught at the edges of the waves, like it was being pulled to shore. Steve watched for a moment, then said, "He almost retired a few years ago, did I tell you that?"

"You didn't, but Joe did. I may have asked him once what the heck the restaurant thing was all about," she clarified, seeing the look on his face. "It didn't seem like your sort of thing." 

"I just...it could have been my sort of thing? I mostly wanted a reason for him to stay in Hawaii," Steve said. The tightness in his chest was back. "He had a list of the stuff he wanted to do when he pensioned out, and I, you know, nagged at him until he told me he'd thought about it. It seemed like something I could get behind." 

"Too bad Danny didn't have a list of what makes you happy, so he could have found a reason he could get behind for you to stay." She said the words as light as air, but they landed true on target anyway. 

"Low blow," he said, meeting her eyes. 

"I thought between you and me, we had an understanding that truth isn't a cheap shot," she answered, raising an eyebrow. "Like how you're telling me you wanted a reason for Danny to stay, but the restaurant was also something that brought you closer together, wasn't it?"

"We were already close." He frowned. "What are you getting at?" 

"Only that you clearly miss Danny," she said. 

"Like someone cut off my right arm," he said honestly. She looked out at the ocean, and then back at him from the corner of her eye; she stirred her drink with its tiny umbrella, and let the silence speak. 

In the silence, he heard everything she hadn't said, and everything he hadn't corrected her about. Not, _you miss your team_. Not, _I miss them all._

"Go home, Steve. Why don't you go home?"

"It's not time yet. I'm..." He stopped, unsure of what he was leaving unsaid. "I'm still trying to understand." 

"I think you understand more than you think. You're just not ready to look this thing in the eye." Catherine pulled her fringed shawl around her shoulders; the wind had picked up. "Let me know how I can help." 

He gave her a wry smile. "It's really unfair that you're so good at what you do." 

"Pot, kettle," she said, smiling back. 

She turned her phone back on the next morning, and stopped ignoring the calls and messages that had come in. That evening, she appeared in his doorway dressed for travel with her backpack in hand, kissed him on the cheek and said, "This has been a wonderful break, but it's time for me to head back." 

He hugged her then, and said those words he had to say, so she'd remember it was important. "Be safe, Cath." 

"'Til next time," she said, favoring him with her beautiful smile. 

It would be a while before he saw her again, he knew. Unlike every other time they'd parted, this time it felt clean; no unfinished business between them. 

He flew from Bali to Australia in search of some tall waves, and spent three weeks surfing from sunup to sundown every day, until his muscles were soft as water and his mind was too exhausted to dredge up fears and worries in his sleep. Danny was right, the beaches in Hawaii were the most beautiful, but the wild remoteness of Australia was appealing. 

Back in Hawaii, his world was arranged in a predictable way he couldn't have imagined when he took over Five-0. He had a house and a job and a dog and a partner. He thought about that every morning, because the threads of his life presented themselves to him every day at breakfast, like a ball of colored yarn to patiently untangle. Accidental acquisitions, most of them. A house, inherited from his father. A job, because he was too stubborn to give control to some asshole _haole_ cop he'd never met. A dog, because fate put Eddie in his path. 

But the partner...he had Danny in his life because he'd willed it to happen the second day he'd known Danny's name. Within a week, he couldn't imagine a life without Danny Williams as a permanent part of it. 

Over the years, more of their lives had connected and blended, become less overlapping lines and more a single closed circle. Inside that charmed enclosure, he was Uncle Steve to two beautiful kids, and he was Danny's next of kin and medical proxy on every official form, and he would have power of attorney for Danny in an emergency. In fact, he knew everything about Danny - literally everything, from all the on-and-off-agains with Rachel, to the one-night hook-up with one of Steve's SEAL buddies that had left Danny wrecked for a week, to the kind of toothpaste he used and his preferred brand of underwear. 

He knew other, even more intimate things, too: the way Danny's fingertips felt against Steve's skin when he touched him to comfort or restrain or console; the way their bodies fit together, when they were pressed close. Even the way Danny's voice softened when he wanted Steve to really hear him, and how it washed over Steve, smoothing his bleeding edges. 

They'd gone to at least two different kinds of therapy, which had begun as a joke and become a lens through which both of them could see - dimly - how much more they cared about each other than anyone else in their lives. With enough prying, they'd talked about their feelings or whatever, but they'd never talked about those most intimate things without one or the other of them deflecting it off into deep space. They simply understood and _enjoyed_ each other, and it added a depth and texture to their partnership that was different than the bonds with his former teammates -- much different, and far beyond that, now. 

Steve had lived on the edge while he was deployed to SEAL teams, confining all his one-night stands and hookups to the shadows, because they came in all shapes and sizes and genders. No relationships. He'd never wanted to know any of them well, because they were all security risks and potential anchors, and he was on the move. Addicted to the rush. Addicted to not needing anyone, and never betraying a wound. Never being honest, only careful, in a way that reinforced lifelong lessons about showing weakness. 

He'd been too young when his father taught him love was dangerous, and only distance could cure that condition. Joe had reinforced it by leaving every time Steve got near secrets and truths, and Steve had done it to Danny without a second thought when he'd gone chasing after Joe. Even his mother had justified some of what she'd done in the name of protecting him. The lessons he'd learned had gone deep. Never let anyone help; never let anyone come too close, or they might learn truths that can kill. 

Cath was the only person who'd ever come close to breaking through that barrier, and they'd danced around their feelings for half Steve's life. He'd never needed to protect her because she was expert at protecting herself, in every aspect of her life. 

His thoughts always circled back to Danny, in the end. He'd known Danno for ten years, and they'd stood vigil at each others' bedsides more than once, run into danger to help each other without a thought for their own safety. Danny'd seen him kill and helped him hunt killers; he'd watched Steve torture men for information. He'd seen all the darkest parts of Steve, and never flinched away. 

Steve had known for years he would die for Danny, and that Danny would gladly die for him. Why was it that now, after everything, the idea that someone might end Danny's life because he was close to Steve was suddenly too much to bear? 

The answer was in the question, he knew, but Catherine was right. He just...couldn't seem to look at it straight on. 

He surfed, and let his thoughts flow, seeking the source. 

One evening, Danny texted him an increasingly hilarious series of pictures with Eddie apparently gnawing apart every sock either Danny or Steve had ever owned. When his grin faded, Steve felt the first wave of real homesickness he'd felt since his first month at boarding school. More than loneliness; it was a longing for something he hadn't even known he could miss so badly. It had been weeks since he'd talked to Danny, and Danny hadn't called him, either. Respecting his space, maybe. 

He flipped to his recents, and almost hit Danny's number...but instead, he found himself scrolling up through his contacts and dialing another. 

"Hey, boss," Kono said, picking up on the second ring. 

"Hey," he said, fighting against the strange and sudden tears that sprang to his eyes at the sound of her hoarse, sleepy voice. "Did I wake you? It's what, 10 there? I thought maybe you might still be up."

"Always for you, Steve. It's been a while! You didn't answer my last text, so I was checking up on you."

"Of course you were," he murmured, smiling out at the sparkling ocean. "You activate that ohana network?"

"You know it. Chin was worried, too. After what happened to Danny, we were all worried about you."

"Worried about me? Save it for Danny, that guy gets himself into the craziest situations."

"Yeah, good thing he usually has someone there to get him out of it, right?" 

"Subtle," Steve said, and she laughed softly. It was the best thing he'd heard in weeks. "Did he tell you he got out of that rig Daiyu Mei him chained up in by using a move I taught him?"

"He left that part out, amazingly enough."

"How'd he sound?" Steve asked, because he couldn't help himself. There were a few seconds of silence, and then she answered, 

"You know, I was worried about you before, but now that I know you haven't called him, I'm 'bout to snatch you up." 

"What're you talking about? I just." Steve hesitated, and then he sighed. "He needed some time, to recuperate. Those were bad injuries."

"Yeah, so I heard. You think he's getting better because you're staying away instead of waiting on him like an overprotective nanny? That's some strange logic, even for you." 

"No, that's not...wow, when you put it like that, I'm questioning what kind of stories he's been telling you." The joke did not land, because Kono knew them way too well. 

"I know a little bit about being in the wind when someone's waiting for you to head home," she said. "But I was moving toward something when I left, with a purpose in mind, even though I hurt Adam in the process. What're you doing, Steve? I mean, how are you, really? Since you called me, and all."

"I don't know," he said truthfully. "Kono, I can't tell up from down right now. I know it's selfish to stay away, I do. But Danny almost died. What if they...what if next time, I don't have anything to trade, or it's not in my power to give it up? It's too big a risk."

"Wow," Kono said. "Wow, did you just say you thought it was selfish to stay away because you're protecting Danny?"

"...yes?" Steve answered. When he thought about it, it...really did seem backwards, in a way. He sat back in the camp chair and closed his eyes. "I want to be there, Kono. But I am bringing nothing with me but misery and grief these last few years. I can't, I can't be the one to lead disaster right to him."

"And if something happens and you're not there?" Like a knife, driven straight between his ribs; Steve hunched over in the chair, Danny's bloody face in his mind's eye again. But she wasn't done with him. "You're the one who taught me there's no guarantees. There's only being there when it counts. Hate to break it to you boss, but you loving someone won't kill them. It probably won't kill you, either. And you don't get to decide whether they get to love you, or what it will mean for them if they do. If you think you can make them stop loving you by leaving, and that makes them safe, you're just wrong." 

He struggled to breathe, for a moment, to compartmentalize the feeling, but all his mental boxes seemed to have blown open. There was no stuffing it down. So he took a deep breath, and another, and Kono was quiet, listening to him pull it together. "Okay?" she asked eventually, and he made some noise that meant yes and no, all at once. 

About the time he could feel his heartbeat settle back to normal, she spoke again. "It's not selfish to want to protect him, Steve, but you can't do it from there. And it's not selfish to want to protect yourself, either - you've taken a lot of hits that would put other people down for good. I was there for some of them. But I don't think the answer is to stay away." 

"Maybe not," he said reluctantly. "But it still feels like it is. Down deep, Kono." 

"Then maybe for once, don't trust your gut," she said. "If your compass is broken, get a new one." 

Familiar words; he'd said them to her, when she'd cried on the phone with him one night, asking if it was fair for her to put the lives of strangers ahead of her love for Adam. If she should come back to the island, and make the best of the convenient life they'd laid out there together, even though it was already fading into the distance. 

"Fair enough," he said. "Love you, Kono."

"Love you back. Gonna kick your ass straight back to the islands though if you call me again and Danny is not right there shouting in your ear." 

"Take care," he said, and hung up.

That night, he didn't sleep, but sat beside the ocean, turning her words over in his mind. Selfish was the only word he had for it - for putting aside his overwhelming need to be there with Danny and the team, and to ensure Danny's safety. For leaving to try and find his equilibrium, because the body blows hadn't stopped in years, and Danny's kidnapping had almost put him down so hard, he wouldn't see any point in getting up again. For leaving Danny alone when he needed Steve, when he'd asked him to reconsider going. It was all selfish, in Steve's book. 

As the sun was starting to glimmer on the horizon, he made his decision. One more week to get the ship righted, and then he'd go back home - at least for a little while, to see how Danny was. Or at least, that was what he told himself. Some part of him knew that once he crossed that threshold, it'd be that much harder to leave again. Maybe that was the whole point. Maybe he'd been focusing too much on the reasons to stay away, instead of working toward giving himself permission to go back. 

Maybe he could stop being everyone's self-appointed protector, and be selfish for his own sake, for a change. Maybe he'd somehow missed the mark on protecting himself; maybe that was a two-person job. 

Maybe he could at least be honest with himself, and admit that he wanted to be with Danny. 

He was still staring out at the ocean when the sun rose. No chance of getting any sleep, so he grabbed a board and paddled out into the ocean. The noise in his brain was quieting down now that he'd cleared away some of the debris; the picture was sharpening into focus. 

Because the universe loved irony, he was two days from heading home when Danny stopped texting. He realized it on the second day without a completely wrong emoji popping up in one of Danny's daily barrage of texts - now gone quiet - and then he dialed Lou, his heartbeat pounding against his phone where it rested against his temple. 

"Well, hey there," Lou answered, and the deliberately casual way of it - no surprise, no delight, just a heaviness covered with cheer - made Steve bite out - 

"What's happened to Danny?"

"Good to talk to you, too," Lou said, and there was the sarcasm Steve had missed. "Now before you freak out, take a deep breath of whatever the hell air you're breathing, because he's fine." 

"Why, why would I freak out?" Steve demanded. The duffel was already on the bed and he began tossing clothes into it from the hotel dresser drawers. 

"He had a little accident. Probably shouldn't have been back at work anyway, but you know how hard-headed he is - like looking in a mirror for you, isn't it, Steve? - and he was working a case, and he went over the side of a small cliff in the-"

"I'm on my way back," Steve said, zipping the duffel. "Do not, do _not_ , let him out of that hospital, Lou, I will be there-"

"Okay, okay, but listen, he's fine, you don't need to-"

"Good talking to you," Steve said, "see you tomorrow," and hung up. He needed the phone to move up his flight.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If anyone anywhere ever thought I'd miss the chance to repurpose the lovely Catherine into Steve's trauma and relationship counselor once TPTB put her on that plane, they were sadly mistaken. 
> 
> Chapter 3 will be posted tomorrow. Hopefully AO3 will cooperate and let people know when it's there. :)


	3. Chapter 3

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Reunions, pasta, mature conversations, all sorts of feelings, and making excellent use of a freshly made bed.

Adam met him at the airport with a hug and his badge and gun, and Steve accepted all three gratefully, and without comment. It made sense that they'd nominated Adam for pick-up detail, because he valued silences and disliked small talk. It gave Steve the space to find his footing again, without grasping for words. 

It wasn't until they turned off toward Steve's home, which was on the other side of the island from the hospital, that Steve spoke. "Couldn't keep him strapped down to a gurney, I guess?"

Adam chuckled. "His injuries weren't serious, just a mild concussion and some scrapes and bruises. He's more pissed about the car than anything. And before you say it - the minute he came back to work and took over as head of the task force, he wrestled his keys away from Cole."

"Literally?" 

Adam laughed. "No, not literally. But I would have paid to see that." 

They grinned at each other as Adam pulled up in front of Steve's house. "We didn't tell him you were coming. He's already mad enough." 

"He'll get over it." Steve climbed out and grabbed his duffel from the back seat. "Thanks, Adam."

"You back for good, or...just back for now?" Adam asked, his tone carefully neutral. 

Steve hesitated. "Not sure yet, man. Depends."

"On whether you find what you're looking for?" 

Steve leaned down, one hand on the top of the car, to look Adam in the eye and see that level gaze coming back at him. It was hell being known so well, and having people care so much they couldn't stay out of his business. No wonder he'd avoided it half his life. Also, it was good to know that Adam and Kono were speaking to each other again; he'd have to get the rest of that story later. He sighed and straightened, and tapped the top of the car. "Thanks for the ride," he said, as he closed the door. 

He could hear Eddie whining before he even hit the front walk, and when he cracked the door, a mass of golden fur almost knocked him down. "Hey, boy, hey," he said softly, dropping the duffel so he could crouch down for some loving. Eddie nosed him all over until he was thoroughly satisfied that Steve was Steve, and then he sat down and looked at Steve so accusingly, Steve had to laugh. "I've missed you too, boy. Where's Danno, huh?" 

In answer, Eddie got up and paced a few steps toward the back door, and then back again. Steve rubbed behind the dog's ears. "You didn't know Danno back when he was allergic to sand. Glad he's over that now." He straightened and said, "Be a good boy and wait right here, okay? Such a good boy." 

He snagged a beer for himself, and another for Danny, on his way out back. 

It was a beautiful day, humid, not too hot, and Danny was a distant speck in the ocean. Steve took a long, deep breath of island air, the first since he'd stepped off the plane. It was good to be back; there was a soft, contented hum at the back of his brain. 

Five minutes later, the ocean coughed up Danny Williams in a pair of black board shorts with green piping, and nothing else. He jogged up the beach, hair going wild every which way, wiping water from his face and eyes and staring at Steve like he was going blind. Steve smiled at him, though his attention kept dropping to the new scar tissue above Danny's heart, and the fresh bruises all the way up his right torso. 

After a tiny pause, Danny kept walking, right up to Steve and into a wet hug. Steve wrapped his arms around him; Danny smelled of seaweed with a side of antiseptic and --

"Welcome home," Danny said, and Steve squeezed him - just a little - and let him go. 

"It's good to be here," Steve answered. It was true, for the first time in a very long time. 

Danny reached over for his towel, which he gave a token rub around his chest now that he'd dried himself on Steve's T-shirt, and grabbed one of the beers off the table. "I'm gonna kill those traitors, though. Which of 'em called you? I told them not to call you." 

He wasn’t about to tell Danny that they hadn’t tattled on him. "How could they not call me? How could _you_ not call me, for that matter?"

"Because I'm perfectly fine, thanks. Also I was actually still hurt worse than this when you left, perhaps you will recall. You just got back, can you not with the mother hen?" Danny took a long swig of beer, probably mixing it with two different kinds of painkillers and god knew what other meds, and then set the beer bottle down on the table with a thud. His eyes raked over Steve head to toe, with the strange effect of giving Steve goosebumps, and he let out a long sigh. "At least you look fantastic."

"Do I?" Steve smiled at him, a genuine smile that didn't feel wrenched out like so many had the last several months, and Danny rolled his eyes. 

"Well, you know, for values of how you're not covered in your blood or mine currently, which is a nice change by the way, and there aren't any slings or bandages or black eyes, so you probably haven't been off destroying terror cells for fun or liberating oppressed nations single-handedly, or anything." 

The words washed over Steve like the warm island air, and his smile widened. "Had to see for myself you were okay, you know. So soon after the chest wound." 

"Funny you should mention chest wounds," Danny said, and then his face closed up, and he shook his head, and the unsubtle metaphor rattled around between them for a moment. "Anyway."

"So what prompted you to drive your car over a cliff?" Steve meant it to be conversational, though it felt anything but, where that tightness in his chest liked to flare up from time to time. 

"Avoiding a head-on with a civilian SUV. Which, and let's be clear, I'm like one million percent sure you would have also done, so let's not with the 'oh Danny hates pursuit driving' because I have demonstrated my driving-like-a-cop skills many times in the last decade, I'm sure you'll agree."

"I do, I do," Steve said amiably, "though I question your commitment when lives aren't at stake." 

"Well in this case, they were, so I was doing my very best to max out the speedometer while not killing anyone in the process. You'd have been proud."

"I bet." Steve was willing to go on with that conversation forever, because it gave him a chance to just look at Danny, at all his damaged, defensive edges, without consequence. "For the record? I'm always proud of you." 

"Oh, my god," Danny sighed, and levered himself down into the beach chair. "You've been gone too long, you've forgotten how to do this," and there he gestured between himself and Steve. "Will you sit? Sit, you're making me nervous."

Steve sat, and for a minute they drank beers and watched the ocean like it was any other day, and Steve let the nearness of Danny soothe him, even if Danny was too quiet for his liking. 

The reason why became clear a moment later. "So, this epic quest you were on. Did you find what you were looking for?"

Steve tilted his head toward Danny. "Maybe. Still working that out."

"But you're in a better place?" Danny sounded cautiously hopeful. 

"Yeah. Yeah, I think so."

"Excellent." A long pause, and then, very casually: "How's Catherine?"

Steve searched Danny's usually expressive face for a long moment, but it was as neutral as he'd ever seen it. "Oh, you heard about that?"

"Lincoln mentioned it. That he called her, I mean. I figured the rest out from there."

"Whatever you're thinking, that isn't what happened."

"You didn't run off to find peace with Catherine without once mentioning that she was with you? Because it seems like that's exactly what happened."

"Seems like." Steve set his bottle down. "Isn't." 

"I'm all ears," Danny said, and it was the most important, most careful thing he'd ever said to Steve, in what seemed like a lifetime of those kinds of openers. 

Steve took his time. It was too important to get wrong. 

"I didn't go to her. I didn't ask her to come to me. Lincoln took that on himself." Steve met Danny's eyes. "We went as friends; we parted as friends," Steve said, and stopped there, because the rest would be a lot harder. 

"And you're good with that?"

"Very good with it." 

"Go on," Danny said. It was just as well they had that decade of friendship and several different kinds of therapy between them, because Steve knew Danny's 'patiently waiting for Steve to open up' look very well. Not that it made talking about his feelings any easier. Nothing could, at this point. But he had to get it right, push through the instinct to close up...so he gathered his thoughts and gave it a shot. 

"I've spent my whole life running toward situations instead of away from them," Steve said slowly. "For a long time, I was fine with it - with whatever happened because of it, because it was only about me. Then I had this team, and you, and this - this family, and I kept pushing, all the time, pushing until I, I don't know. I lost my way a little."

"I knew that," Danny said. "I mean, I could see that. But you shut me out. All those nights pacing around, all those two-hour pre-dawn runs on the beach. You wouldn't talk to me."

"Yeah," Steve said. "Not wouldn't. Couldn't, is more like it. It was...complicated. I had some things mixed up in my head. That's why I couldn't talk about it, Danno. I couldn't get it straight." He hesitated. "I wanted peace, but I guess really I was running away."

After a long moment, Danny said, "Cowards run away. You're no coward. So let's get that straight." 

"Well, thank you," Steve said, but Danny charged on. 

"So if we maybe say you were avoiding something because you couldn't control that thing, what would that be?"

"Losing you," Steve said. Just getting the words out was a relief, weight lifting directly from his heart. "I didn't think I could get through losing you. I was running from...avoiding...what you'd say if I said I couldn't deal with that. From...I don't know, Danny, from having to explain why it didn't matter that you can take care of yourself, that I couldn't risk you anymore. Not anymore." 

"I get that," Danny said. "Do you think I don't get that? That I don't want you to be safe, either? I've spent ten years trying to keep you from killing yourself, Steve."

"That really isn't the same thing -- you knew what I was like the minute we started working together." 

"Oh, really? It isn't? I mean really Steve, what the hell do you think motivates me to shout at you when you do these amazingly dumb things you do? Fear of the sight of blood? No, it's having to keep picking your broken body up from the ground after you run right at danger like an incredibly brave, incredibly stupid idiot. It's being afraid that one day--" Danny stopped, and he was turning alarmingly pale; Steve reached for him, and Danny slapped his hand away. "One day you won't get up or bounce back, and there won't be anything I can do about it." Danny heaved a deep breath. "The difference between you and me is, I know I'm not the cause of it. Doesn't matter, I faced these fears about losing you a long time ago and made my peace with it. I accept you for who you are, I accept what might happen, I accept I'm going to lose you, I accept it because I literally have no choice. Talk about control, what a joke. I accepted all of this, because that's the only way I get to have even a _moment_ of happiness, you--" He bit off whatever else he'd meant to say and got up from the chair, turned back toward the house. "I hope you figure it out, Steve, I do." 

"Danny, wait," Steve said. He lunged for Danny, and managed to knock both of them off balance in the process. They hung on to each other for a moment, Danny hissing at the impact. "Sorry, sorry," Steve said, but he didn't let go. 

"Steve, will you let-let me-" Danny stopped, and looked up at him, and they both went still, the tension snapping between them. 

"I've got my head on straight now," Steve said quietly. "I know we all signed up for this. I know I haven't made it easy, and you could lose me, the same as...as I could lose you. I just...what happens to the people I love, my responsibility for them, it all got tangled up together, for a while. What happened to you struck too close to the bone. I needed time to see it clearly." 

"Enlighten me," Danny said, still not moving away. 

"I want you to be happy," Steve said. "I want-- I want you to be safe, watch Gracie get married and Charlie grow up, and be there for all of it."

"Okay," Danny said slowly. "I want that too. I want us _both_ to be there." 

Steve dropped Danny's arm and ran a hand through his hair. The words just weren't there. He couldn't-

"Hey," Danny said. He put both hands on Steve's chest, warm, gentle. "Hey. Listen. I'm going to go inside and shower and put clothes on like a decent human being. And then I'm cooking dinner, no don't give me that face, I'm an excellent cook and I'm hungry, and you look like someone's been starving you. So we're gonna eat, and then, I don't know, finish this talk like civilized people do, all right? Okay?"

Steve nodded, and then he said out loud, "Yeah, dinner sounds great," because Danny looked two seconds from dragging Steve back to the house by force. The truth was, the moment Danny turned and marched back toward the house, Steve felt like he was centered again for the first time in weeks. Months, maybe. Like somehow, they might manage this conversation, even if it broke him a little inside. 

So he followed in Danny's wake to the house, because there was nothing he wanted more. 

**

Steve showered in the master bathroom. When he emerged to put on a fresh polo shirt and cargo pants, he saw the naked mattress had been freshly made up with clean sheets, plus the ugly blue comforter that was normally in the guest room. Which meant Daniel had hijacked that soft, light, amazing comforter Steve normally sprawled all over for his own use. Something about that made Steve grin, even as he ripped the comforter off the bed and deposited it outside the guest bedroom door on his way downstairs, glancing inside as he passed. 

It took a second to register, so he went back a step or two and took a real look inside. There was a black duffel bag at the foot of the bed, and T-shirts neatly folded in a row on the floor beside it. A toiletry kit, and a pair of jeans. Steve frowned. Danny'd already moved in all his clothes months ago, so this wasn't that. And the pile sitting there waiting to be packed was not the kind of stuff he'd be packing if he were moving out because Steve was home now. 

Eddie was waiting at the bottom of the stairs, and Steve sat down there with him to have a little uncomplicated quality time while he thought about the fact that Danny was packing. "Did you look after him, Eddie? Huh? I hope you did a better job than I'm doin' right now," he said softly. Eddie licked his face, and Steve kissed the top of his furry head. The house was quiet, just the sounds of Danny moving around in the kitchen, and delicious smells of Parmesan cheese and meat sauce. 

He thought about the night he'd told Danny he was leaving, that he had to go. He'd been afraid, he realized now - afraid that Danny might persuade him to stay, and the consequence of it. Afraid of the feelings that overwhelmed him whenever he heard the progression of their names: Dad, Mom, Joe, Danny. Family. 

_I have the person you care most about in the world._

Afraid of what would happen if he stopped fearing it and tried to understand why the trauma he'd endured and compartmentalized for years had become panic when he looked at Danny's injuries. Most of all, afraid of being laid bare in front of Danny, and testing what he believed to be true, without any guarantee of the cost of that truth. 

"Yo," Danny hollered from the kitchen, "my delicious spaghetti will not eat itself."

"That doesn't even make sense," Steve shouted back, with a final rub behind Eddie's ears. "I'll make sure you get some too," he said to Eddie, who gave a happy bark. 

Turned out there wasn't just spaghetti and meatballs, there was also garlic bread and wine. Steve set down a bowl of pasta with a couple meatballs for Eddie, and then gratefully accepted a heaping plate and a glass of wine. He mowed his way through the spaghetti with his eyes half closed. "This really is delicious," he said. 

"No cracks about my cooking? I'm getting worried," Danny said, but he looked pleased all the same. He sat there, barefoot and yet overdressed in black slacks and a white open-collared shirt, looking sleek and handsome and smug, and it was perfect. Better than Steve had hoped for. 

"So, Peru, tell me everything," Danny said, pretty obviously easing them past the awkward conversation phase as a wind-up for the post-dinner Big Talk. He'd always been good at clearing a space for Steve, so when he was ready, he would find his way. Little did Danny know, Steve had been saving up his best stories for this moment; there wasn't much he and Danny hadn't shared the last ten years, and this way Danny could see it through his eyes. 

Steve finished his wine and Danny poured another glass, and then opened a second bottle while Steve described the sunset sky over the ocean in Bali, and the sounds of birds at sunrise. He moved on to talking about his encounter with an amorous llama in Peru, complete with video shot by Catherine, and had Danny laughing until tears came out of his eyes. 

"Good memories," Steve said fondly. He picked up Eddie's bowl, plus his plate and Danny's, and took them to the sink to scrape them into the garbage disposal. Behind him, Danny wrapped up the leftover bread and capped the wine. 

"Hold up, I'm gonna need another glass of that wine," Steve said. He held his glass out to Danny, who filled it and then his own, and then set the empty bottle on the counter. Steve started to fill the sink with water for the dishes, and Danny stopped him with a touch to his wrist. 

"No, don't. Leave that for now, all right?" 

"Sure." Steve wiped his hands on a dish towel, and circled the center island to lean against the stove, while Danny hopped up on the counter beside the microwave. Steve didn't miss his wince at the jolt when his butt landed on the tile, but chose not to point it out. One lecture a day about being overprotective was enough. 

They were a few arms' length from each other, like this - it was reassuring for Steve to be close to Danny, even for this conversation. They sipped at their wine, and then Danny said, "I'm gonna go first, okay?"

"Okay," Steve said, a little confused at where this conversation was actually going if Danny was starting it, and then he blurted out, "Why are you packing? Are you moving out?"

Danny blinked. "So much for going first. Okay, Sherlock, well since you were snooping-"

"I wasn't snooping, the door was literally open, I walked right by it and by the way, it's my house-"

"-I was coming to look for you," Danny said loudly, talking right over Steve's perfectly logical objections. "All right? Okay? That's what was happening, I was going to get a flight out to Sydney this weekend."

"What? Why?" 

"Because, you stopped calling, is why. Because your texts got shorter and shorter, and you didn't respond to any of my insults for over a week, and that's just not..." Danny looked down at his knees. "That's a whole other level of avoidance, for you. For us. I was worried." 

"Last time you were worried, you moved into my house," Steve said softly. "The time before that, you flew across the country. Now you were gonna track me down across an ocean?"

Danny shrugged. "If I had to. Turns out I didn't have to, because here you are." He drained his wine glass and set it in the sink. "I've been thinking about that thing you said to me, after your mom died. About how none of this is on our terms, that it's on life's terms. I need you to know, I don't accept that. At all. We make our own choices." He met Steve's eyes. "I came here to this place following Gracie, but that isn't why I stayed. You came here because of your dad, and then you said you stayed because you had this mystery to solve. But Steve, you built a life here that wasn't about that. Not just about that, anyway. It was a choice. So I don't get why now, suddenly, that life isn't enough for you."

Steve crossed his arms over his chest, and looked away, at the fridge, at the floor, at the dishes piled in the sink. Then he said, "You know my dad sent me away when I was 15, right? To protect me, he said." 

"I remember you telling me that, yes." 

"I resented it so much. I didn't get the reasons then, but I do now. Been thinking a lot about that the last few months, how much more I relate to him now than I ever could when I was that resentful teenager. How he made that choice, for me, even though it hurt him, too."

"He was a parent, you were a kid. It's not the same," Danny said.

"No, let me finish. You're right. It's not the same. I've been trying to take back control of things I can't control. I can't control other people's choices. Or, you know what, I can - I can take drastic measures that impact their lives - but sometimes it isn't up to me."

"Your control issues are well known, Steven, we have discussed and debated them until even I'm sick of talking about them," Danny said, with a wryness that made Steve smile. "So to extrapolate," he added, "I'm guessing that you thought by leaving, you were protecting me or some nonsense like that. After all we've been through, and all the times I've saved your ass by the way, in addition to surviving being shot and poisoned and beaten, and let's not forget how I saved myself from a torture dungeon using a ninja move you taught me - you should have been there, it was very impressive if I do say so myself - you must have an incredibly low opinion of my skill set."

"I know it wasn't rational, Danny. I know it, okay? But logic didn't have anything to do with it. I know you can more than take care of yourself, but I also know that all of us, any of us, are on borrowed time. You said it yourself once - every day that you lived past your first partner's death was a gift, right? I feel like every day you lived past that last GSW is a gift, and I had to do everything I could to make sure your time wasn't cut short on account of me."

"That makes no sense," Danny said. "Why now? After all these years and injuries and wipeouts? I was literally shot within a day of meeting you, I’ve been shot in the chest before, this pattern has not broken in years."

"I guess I've just...lost the stomach for losing people I love," Steve said, and there it was. He held his breath for a beat, and let it out slowly, to control the hammering of his heart. 

"Look at me," Danny said sharply, and Steve squared his shoulders and looked up, to meet Danny's eyes. "You talked me out of retiring," Danny said. "When I was in the place you're in now. You roped me into opening that stupid restaurant, and it was a disaster, really, could it have been worse? I think not. But I thought you were dying, is the thing. I thought-" Danny broke off and pressed his lips together. 

Steve leaned in. "You wanted the time to count."

Danny gave a curt nod, but said nothing. 

"You wanted the time to count, with _me_." 

"So sue me." Danny stared at him, defiant, and Steve steadied himself. 

"No, Danno. No, see, I wanted you to be safe and happy. It just never occurred to me - I didn't get that you - that maybe you could be happier with me. Not just - not just running a restaurant, or running a team. But, you know. _With me_. Really my partner." 

"Are you stupid?" Danny demanded, and not for one second in his life had Steve been happier to see that fire light up Danny's eyes. "Two old men, on a beach. Maybe you're deaf, not stupid. Did I not sit right out there in a chair two months ago and tell you in no uncertain terms that this was a thing we could do?"

"You did," Steve agreed. "I guess I...thought we were on different pages about what that meant. Could mean." He paused. "I'm not sure if we are on the same page right now, actually." 

"Yeah, well, it wouldn't be the first time we were shouting at each other from different planets, so. That may have been...a reasonable concern." Danny cleared his throat. "Gotta tell you, partner, we have had some communication issues, and some boundary issues, and some romantic disasters with all the many and sundry other people we have made time with, but this pretty much takes the cake on all of that." 

"No kidding." Steve smiled, but the smile faded quickly, because this might be the longest talk they'd ever had and he had no idea what the hell they'd resolved, if anything at all. "Danno. I'm...not sure I'm good, yet. With the task force, to start with. I'm still working some things out. But I don't want to be anywhere but here. With you. Really with you. Just so that's clear."

Danny nodded thoughtfully, and Steve's eyes were drawn to the vulnerable line of his neck, and the bruises below he couldn't see. "You going to lose your mind and run off again to protect me - so asinine, honestly - if I get shot or get a bleeding hangnail or something, which is highly likely? Obviously not as likely as you getting your head blown off at some point, but let's not borrow trouble." The words were light, but the wariness in Danny's eyes was not. 

"No. It took me a little time to see that part of what makes what's between us work is...that."

"Mutual injuries?"

"No," Steve said, laughing a little. "Big risk, big reward. You know I love how good you are at what you do." 

"And when we're off the job?" Danny was just...sitting there, with his posture open and his eyes still wary, vulnerable and strong and honest, and Steve wanted to say whatever reassuring thing would uncoil that wariness. But words seemed difficult again, so instead he closed the distance between them. He put his hands on Danny's knees, a silent request, and Danny spread his legs so Steve could step between them. 

"Danno, everything I built here, this life - this team, this family - you built it with me, or even for me, in some cases. Without you, it all falls apart." 

Danny took hold of Steve's belt loops and pulled him close; at the same time, Steve got his hands under Danny's ass and slid him forward, and then - Danny shivered, because Steve leaned his whole body into Danny’s, like maybe he could meld them together if he got close enough. 

He tilted his head, mesmerized by the sea-green of Danny's eyes, and just then, those eyes crinkled at the corners as Danny smiled; Steve grinned back, and ran his hand gently down Danny's arm. 

"My side hurts, take it easy," Danny said, but he said it soft, and he was looking at Steve's mouth. 

Steve rolled his eyes. "Gotta take your mind off it, don't think about it," he said, and kissed him. 

It was the best first kiss Steve had had in years, the kind that started out relentless and ended up slow like sunshine, with Danny's hand curled around the nape of Steve's neck, and Steve's hand curved around the back of Danny's head. He wanted the feel of Danny's mouth moving against his forever, the way the lean muscle of Danny's body pressed closer. That he could have this - that Danny would let him have this - made him dizzy with want. 

One kiss led to another, and then another, and then Danny nuzzled under his ear and his mouth was on Steve's neck, and Steve threw his head back to give him more access. Danny skimmed his hands up Steve's sides, and his teeth grazed the sensitive skin above his collarbone; Steve sighed with pleasure, which provoked a low, throaty moan from Danny, and the sound of it made Steve hard.

When he reached for Danny's belt buckle, Danny's fingers wrapped gently around his wrists. "No," he said. "Wait." 

Immediately Steve stopped, backed up - he thought he'd read Danny right, but -

"Whatever just shot through that primate brain of yours, don't," Danny said. He brushed his thumb across Steve's cheek. "Listen to me. Are you listening? This is not a one-night stand, not with you, don't treat me like one." 

"So what you're saying is, don't rip your clothes off in the kitchen," Steve said, a helpless grin on his face. But it faded quickly when Danny leaned up to kiss him, gently. 

"Yeah, no. I'm saying, and I really can't believe I'm saying it, but you need to take me to bed and for once in your goddamned life, slow down, okay?" 

"Yes, Danny. Yes." Steve kissed him again, because it was so easy, because it was the best decision he'd ever made, and then he let go so Danny could hop down from the counter to head upstairs - not to the guest room, this time. 

Danny stopped at the base of the stairs to give Eddie a little pet behind the ears, and Steve melted a little; he took that opportunity to crowd Danny against the wall and kiss him again. "You make me crazy," Danny informed him, arching off the wall into Steve's hands. Steve couldn't help it, he was hungry for the feel of Danny's body against him already, warm and eager, and for the way Danny laughed a little between moans when Steve pressed the heel of his hand against Danny's cock, just to see if Danny was hard for him. 

They stumbled up the stairs together without taking their hands off each other, and into Steve's bedroom. In the time it took Steve to switch on the bedside lamp, Danny had his pants off and was through half the buttons on his shirt. "Whoa, hey," Steve said, moving in to put a halt to that. "What happened to going slow? You trying to take all the fun out of it?"

"This is where normally I make a joke about getting to it before you run away again," Danny said, "but that would be in poor taste."

Steve deliberately pushed Danny's hands aside. He took his time working the last few buttons open, holding Danny's gaze the entire time. "Now who's not listening?" He pushed Danny's shirt off his shoulders and tugged it down his arms, so Danny could let it fall to the floor. "I'm here. You know how I get when I make my mind up. Not gonna change it now." 

"Good to know," Danny said, and until that moment, Steve somehow hadn't realized Danny might be unsure of him, that he might need Steve to prove he was all in. It was a challenge he was happy to accept. 

He slid his hands below the hem of Danny's undershirt and skinned it up and off, and then he kissed Danny again for good measure, because it had been a couple seconds since he'd had the taste of him, and all he wanted was more. Danny kissed him like he was starving for it too; he plucked at Steve's shirt until he found skin, and Steve deepened the kiss, pulling Danny in tight. 

He walked Danny backwards to the bed and gave him a gentle shove, and Danny narrowed his eyes but he sat, pulling off his shorts. Steve wanted to test Danny's limits, push him in every way he could think of, just to see Danny push back and see that familiar fire snapping in his eyes. Danny scooted toward the pillows, and Steve stared at him, sprawled out over Steve's bed like a feast. Their history together, ancient and new, was written in color all over his pale skin. The bruises on his torso were scattered dark blue and yellow, and the gunshot wound scar tissue, so close to Danny's heart, made Steve's heart skip a couple protective beats in sympathy.

Danny stretched his arms out over his head, and then gave a full body stretch, watching Steve's face through half-slitted eyes. His dick gave an interested twitch where it was hard against his belly, and Steve stared appreciatively at the show he was putting on until Danny said, "You gonna get over here so I can try you out?" 

Steve lifted his chin, successfully distracted from Danny's body, and crinkled his face at Danny. "Try me out? What, like a used car?"

"I am not touching the driving metaphor, no matter how tempting," Danny said. And then he reached down and wrapped his own hand around his cock, stroking it a couple of times and successfully short-circuiting Steve's power of speech for a moment. "Get naked." 

Steve shrugged his polo over his head, and barely had it off before Danny said, "Huh. I forget how hot those tattoos are every time until you flash them again." 

"This is a thing you've considered?" Steve unbuckled his belt with deliberate swagger, yanked it off, and tossed it on the floor. "How hot the ink is?"

"Every time you took your shirt off for at least the last nine and a half years, which means I've had plenty of opportunities," Danny said, which...Steve felt the weight of that lost time for a moment. But they had needed all of it, every argument and shouting match and silence and separation, for the now to be possible. 

He yanked off his shoes and cargo pants, not gracefully, and considered his options for a second before crawling on the bed and laying on his side. Danny turned to face him, and they stared at each other for a second, waiting for the weirdness to pass. 

Danny traced Steve's transplant scar with two fingers, and then scratched at the couple day's growth of stubble on Steve's chin. "There's a lot more gray than there used to be."

"You're not even responsible for all of it," Steve said. "Sixty...seventy percent, maybe. Closer to eighty, after this last couple months."

"Wow, if I'd'a known you were such a sweet talker in bed, we'd have done this a long time ago," Danny said, his eyes crinkled at the corners again. Steve smoothed them with a fingertip. 

"A lot of years we lived through, to get us here," he said softly. He closed the distance to kiss Danny again, to rest his hand on Danny's hip, where it most naturally wanted to fall. 

Danny reached out to drape an arm over Steve's side, to press his hand against the middle of Steve's back and urge him closer. From there, it was easy to let his hands go everywhere on Danny's body, at first careful, and then less so, when Danny didn't stop him from going a little rough. It was tough to take his time; a sense of urgency swept over him in desperate waves, to make sure Danny knew he meant it, that he wanted this. Every time he could feel his heart racing, he focused on the sounds Danny was making, the soft ohs of pleasure and surprise. Danny's mouth on his nipples made Steve lose focus for a second; he could feel Danny's lips curve against his skin when it happened. 

"You like that," Danny said, his words vibrating against Steve's chest. 

In answer, Steve pushed Danny onto his back, and kissed him, and then gently bit Danny's lower lip, to be rewarded by Danny surging up into the kiss. He wrapped his hand around Danny's cock and gave him some pressure, and a couple hard strokes. Danny threw his head back against the pillow and groaned. "Not fair," he said hoarsely, and Steve grinned. 

"You wanted fair?" he asked, kissing Danny's throat, then his collarbone. Danny's eyes were half-closed, his mouth open and wet and for once not moving, and Steve pressed in close to say, low, "I'd rather play dirty." 

"Tell me something I don't kn-" Steve had been ready for it, and he kissed the sarcasm right off that smart, sensitive mouth. Danny's hands moved to Steve's ass, and yanked him forward, and it was Steve's turn to shiver as their cocks brushed together. 

No surprise to Steve that they moved together in bed the same way they always had in the field, guided by unspoken cues. He paid careful attention to Danny's expression, listened to the rhythm of his breath; when Danny pushed his hips forward, Steve closed his hand around Danny's cock and moved with him, bit down on his shoulder just a little when Danny's fingers curled into fists against his back. Danny pushed his fingers against Steve's mouth; Steve sucked at them and watched Danny's face go slack with pleasure. 

He slid down Danny's body, setting a path across all his hurts with kisses and touch, and took his cock in his mouth, watching as he cursed and bucked on the bed. Their eyes locked as Steve went down on him, taking his sweet time learning how fast Danny liked it, how much pressure he wanted, enjoying the little whines he made when Steve licked the tip before taking him in again. When Danny was close, Steve moved back up his body and settled on top of him for a kiss, deep, the thrill of Danny's tongue in his mouth zeroing out all his higher brain functions. 

He was high on the way Danny cried out when Steve rocked into him; all these new things he was learning about this body he'd had in his arms so many times before. It was happening too fast, and there was no stopping it -- "Come on, Danny," he urged, soft against his mouth, "come for me, come on," and Danny laughed like he couldn't help himself, still and always the best sound Steve had ever heard. 

"Christ, Steve," he said, "Jesus Christ, you - I fucking _love you_ , you _asshole_ ," and that was it, Steve was coming in a white-hot rush, all over his hand and Danny's, while Danny kissed him furiously, like he was in some kind of goddamned hurry to steal all the kisses, and that - that made Steve laugh, breathless, burying his face into Danny's neck to ask hoarsely, 

"That slow enough for you, huh?" 

"You get another chance when you fuck me later," Danny said, and if Steve could have come again on the spot, he would have. As it was, his body twitched like he was still twenty when Danny threw his head back and came into Steve's tight grip. Steve leaned in to kiss the corners of his eyes and mouth, feeling a little tender about it. 

Their movements slowed; Danny chose that moment to wipe his hand off on Steve's ass, and that was it, Steve was laughing again, while Danny curled his fingers possessively over the exact spot where he'd just made the mess on Steve's skin. 

"This is not going exactly how I pictured it," Steve said, still smiling. 

"Oh really? You pictured it? That is so interesting," Danny said, folding himself up into Steve's arms like some sort of weird origami that fit exactly into all the hollows and sharp places of Steves's body. "I have a whole menu of similarly interesting things to discuss with you, but give me a minute, okay?"

Steve held him, sticky and sweaty and worn out. Against Steve's chest, Danno's heartbeat was steady, comforting. Lulling him to sleep. 

**

Faint early morning light woke Steve, and he stretched and moved to turn over for another hour of sleep before he remembered: Danny. He blinked his eyes open to the sight of Danny awake beside him with the sheets low on his bare hips, watching him. 

"You really are every cliché out of a romantic comedy, aren't you?" Steve rasped, smiling. 

"Spoken like a man who has seen every romantic comedy in existence and then lied about it," Danny said, already leaning over to kiss him with not a care in the world for morning breath. Steve slid his arms around Danny and they kissed for a while, lazy; he was developing an appreciation for all the pleasures going slow could afford them. 

"I slept great," Steve said. "Did you?"

"I did not," Danny said. Then he went quiet, which was alarming. He draped himself over Steve's chest and looked at him, that penetrating look that always made Steve want to hide, because it was building up to something. 

"Go on," Steve said, because they were too far into it for him to try running again. 

"You gonna let this happen, Steve? Let me love you?"

Steve sucked in a sharp breath. Whatever he'd thought Danno might say, that wasn't it. The cocky deflection happened by well-practiced reflex. "Not like I can stop you, Danno; I'm pretty lovable." 

Danny propped himself up on one elbow. "Stop. I mean it. This is a good thing, are you going to wreck it?"

"Sorry," Steve said. He shifted onto his side and ran his fingertips through Danny's hair, down to the nape of his neck. "It's...easier for me to love you, in some ways, than to let you love me." 

"I can see we have some work to do here. Also, wow, that is...surprisingly mature and self-reflective," Danny said, his entire face brightening at whatever expression was crossing Steve's face at that moment. "Is there gonna be more of that open and free expression of feelings? 'Cause I'm good with it as long as there's a lot of sex in between."

It took Steve about two seconds to get one arm beneath Danny and another on his hip, shift him gently to his back, and slide half on top of him, eyes narrowing with pleasure when Danny took a startled breath. He kissed Danny until he was writhing and pliant, until they were both smiling into those kisses. 

The reality of it snuck up on him - being there, with Danny, and having it all out in the open. And a desire for Danny so powerful that even now it overwhelmed him, made him pull back and look for excuses. 

"I should go walk Eddie," he murmured, but Danny said,

"Nope," and Steve knew just from the tone of it that he wasn't talking about the dog. "Hey, here is my first and only pre-breakfast relationship demand: from now on, no more punishing yourself for failing to control the world, and death, and what happens to me."

"Can't promise," Steve said. "Work in progress." It came out more flip than he'd intended. He apologized with an extra kiss, and dropped his forehead onto Danny's shoulder. There would probably be a lot more apologies ahead for him. And kisses. Maybe at the same time. 

Danny's arms went around him, and all Steve's anxiety gradually bled away, out into Danno's arms, into the soft blue morning light filtering through their bedroom. Steve breathed, and let himself be home.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you for reading! 
> 
> (PS, did I name this story after a Chaka Khan song? Yes, yes I did. No regrets.)


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